Heavy-flavour production in ALICE at the LHC

ALICE at the LHC is the experiment dedicated to study the physics of nucleus-nucleus collisions. The apparatus is well suited for the measurement of heavy-quark hadron production, making use of the high spatial resolution provided by the tracking detectors and the excellent particle identification, which are distinctive of the ALICE apparatus. Results from proton-proton collisions at sqrt(s) = 2.76 and 7 TeV, and from Pb--Pb collisions at sqrt(s_NN) = 2.76 TeV are presented. The measurements in pp collisions provide an important test of perturbative QCD predictions. The precise vertex reconstruction together with the electron identification, allows the separation of the charm and the beauty components. Furthermore, the pp results are essential as a reference for the measurements in heavy-ion collisions. Nuclear modification factors were measured for D mesons, for electrons and for muons from heavy-flavour hadron decays. The elliptic flow of D mesons is also discussed. These measurements are important because they will provide information on the Quark-Gluon Plasma produced in heavy-ion collisions, via the energy loss of the heavy partons in the strongly interacting medium, and hints on the medium thermalization.